House Majority Leader Rep. Steny Hoyer landed today in Israel with 41 other Democratic Representatives for a week-long, all-expenses-paid junket sponsored by the the educational branch of the lobbying organization AIPAC. Dr. Craig Holman, Government Affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen, who drafted the 2007 Honest Leadership and Open Government Act, designed to curb the influence of lobbyist money in congressional travel, is unequivocal that the trip “defies the spirit as well as the letter of the law.”

The big story coming out of AIPAC is every one in the Democratic leadership dumping all over the first term Muslim congresswoman from Minnesota, Ilhan Omar, while having nothing to say about Benjamin Netanyahu. In the process they have clearly damaged their own standing inside the progressive wing of the party, including among liberal Zionist advocates. When House Majority leader Steny Hoyer said Omar should accuse him of dual loyalty for his support for Israel, he seemed to confirm what she had said.